Artist19: Guy Laramee

Guy Laramee works as a photographer, writer, and sculptor. In his most recent and noted project, Laramee carves landscapes from books. The sculptures shoot up from the pages, creating mountain ranges and temples seated on the peaks. The sense of scale Laramee achieves is particularly impressive. Despite the relatively small physical size of the pieces, each one feels huge on a perceptual level. The high degree of detail and careful use of texture in each part of the landscapes certainly contributes to this illusion of size. The careful lighting in the photographs was also noticeably well done and adds to this effect.

It's important to note that Laramee uses a subtractive approach when creating his sculptures. He only carves from the pre-existing material originally found in the book and uses no additive features (aside from some paints and glues). This design choice is an extension of the concept behind his work. In his artist's statement for the series he discusses the nature of progress and evolution. He questions the nature of the traditional additive model of progress where we, as beings, consider growth/evolution/progress/etc a process in which we must add something to move forward. Laramee theorizes that "knowledge could very well be an erosion instead of an accumulation". This idea is especially relevant in an age where we are expected to take in and process huge amounts of information. Laramee's series is, by far, one of my favorite series I've looked at for this class. Both parts (the concept and the sculptures) work so well together but are strong separately as well - a rare trait in art (in my opinion, at least).

Artist18: Judith Ann Braun

Judith Ann Braun's recent Fingerlings series really got my attention. She uses only he fingers, covered in graphite, to create the pieces in the series. The works composing Fingerlings are diverse, sometimes completely abstract and sometimes reminiscent of traditional Chinese landscape art, are really impressive in size and composition.

Braun took fingerpainting, a form of art generally seen only in children's art, and adapted the basic idea into mature, interesting designs creating in a new and interesting way.

Braun's other series are equally cool. The symmetry in many of her more abstract pieces in the series are especially interesting to me. Symmetry has always been important in my art, with fractal Indian tapestries and Celtic designs exerting a lot of influence on me. Her work is primarily graphite on paper, meaning that Braun makes these by hand. Making symmetrical drawings this exact is quite a feat. Trust me, I've tried. She's definitely an artist I'll be looking at in the coming months.

Artist17: Eric Lacombe

Eric Lacombe (blogspot, tumblr) is a French mixed-media artist. What initially attracted me to his art was his really unique and innovative application and combination of older media (i.e. ink, acrylic, charcoal, etc) in a new, fresh way. His ability to manipulate and change the states of the materials he works with sets his art apart from anything I've seen. I initially thought all of his pieces were digital, with the lines and surreal fading of colors, but, based on the information on his blog(s), a lot of his work is done with acrylic, posca, and ink. He does have a large collection of digital paintings and designs, but I want to concentrate on his use of traditional media in this post.

Lacombe's work carries a decidedly somber tone, with darker values, drooping eyes, and strange forms dominating his pieces. I see a lot of Edvard Munch's influence in his work, with a similar malaise and intensity found in both artists' works.

Edvard Munch's The Scream (1893)                                  Eric Lacombe's Untitled (2012)                             




Lacombe, at times, ventures so far into his design as to make the figured indistinguishable. This confusion leads to a sort disorientation when looking at some of his pieces, making the work that much more visceral. Examples:

Definitely a very interesting artist that I'll be looking at for my own work. His combination of line and ability to create fluid, aqueous textures and designs really caught my eye.

Artist16: Paul Romano

Paul Romano has served as one of my biggest inspirations for design. The first time I saw his art on the cover of Mastodon's album Blood Mountain (pictured left), and I've been following him since. His interest in ancient mythos and arts and his ability to combine both styles and techniques effectively is what first attracted me to his work. I share the same sentiment and have always been fascinated with old, archaic, mysterious, and otherwise ancient art, culture, history, etc.

Romano works in several different styles and mediums, moving from screen printing to digital art to photography, but his art is always identifiable and carries his unique style. One of his most common tools is the intricate, swirling lines that swim and float across his designs. He seems to pull a lot from the medieval Christian monks who would intricately decorate Bibles and transcriptions in his line work. Elements of medieval Japanese and Chinese murals can also be found in his art. Here are a few examples illustrating the presence of these themes in his work:

Romano's fixation on mythology and the according art style affords him a special spot in my list of influences.